How did radio-waves change the course of the war? Was RADAR solely the preserve of the British? What tactics were used to conceal developments? Was there an invisible war in the skies? Battle of the Beams takes a technical and social look at how physics became the forefront of attack and defence. It dives into the people who set their brains to work on the problem, and those who were determined to stop them.

The book honest about the problems of referencing contradictory source material. Some of the work published after the war is obviously biased towards the writer's personal successes - which don't always tally with reality. Similarly, there's a good overview of what both sides were doing in technology. We often only hear about ENIGMA and Britain's attempts to crack it - it's rare to read something from the other side. Here we get to experience both sides as they attempt to tame the radio waves, discover how they are being used against them, and the countermeasures both sides took.

The book is pacey and leaps back-and-forth across the channel, giving a real sense of drama to the sometimes baroque nature of physics research. There is a little touch of the "boys-own-adventure" what with daring fighter pilots and exciting raids - but it never strays into the hagiographic.

As ever with histories of the second World War, you're left wondering how it was the Allies succeeded. The book is full of infuriating little anecdotes like:

The report was filed and then forgotten, seen by some officials, understood by fewer, and then left in the archives of Whitehall. Britain continued for at least a year to believe that it, alone, had mastered this new wonder weapon of radar.

Similarly, a daring piece of espionage was fatally undermined when the defector was imprisoned and then:

through an astonishing cock-up the film he had gone to so much trouble to smuggle in had been sent to be processed at the post office, and most of it had been destroyed.

Gah!

Nevertheless, a fascinating look at how technology develops and how systems react to change.

Would it surprise you to learn that a significant contributor to Victory in Europe was a woman? Britain's first "James Bond" wasn't a suave man leaping from building to building. She was a one-legged American woman who used her wit and cunning to help lay the foundations of guerrilla warfare in France.

I am often amazed that the Allies won the war. The UK's relentless dedication to the "Cult of the Amateur" consistently excluded anyone useful and instead relied on "decent chaps". Only through her persistence did Virginia Hall defy all the people too stuck in their ways to understand what the future of warfare looked like.

The book says:

The future of Allied intelligence in France now rested on a solitary woman who had been written off for most of her adult life.

It doesn't seem like an exaggeration.

The book is a fascinating glimpse at the exploits of someone who should be lauded but is now mostly forgotten. The book highlights how incredibly frustrating it must have been to suffer the ignorance and apathy of men.

she may have been the only F Section field agent to be considered eligible as a Commander of the Order of the British Empire while still active in enemy territory. And as such her citation could not include operational details and hardly did her justice: ‘She has devoted herself whole-heartedly to our work without regard to the dangerous position in which her activities would place her if they were realised by the Vichy authorities. She has been indefatigable in her constant support and assistance for our agents, combining a high degree of organising ability with a clear-sighted appreciation of our needs … Her services for us cannot be too highly praised.’ She was turned down.

Time and time again she proved herself. And time and time again the men of the world dismissed her efforts, failed to recognise her talents, and utterly ignored their responsibilities to her. She showed true courage and fortitude, even when those around her did not.

The book is thoroughly referenced and contains some lovely photographs to round it out. It can be a harrowing read at times, but it covers an important part of our collective history.

This is the extraordinary untold story of the Y-Service, a secret even more closely guarded than Bletchley Park. The Y-Service was the code for the chain of wireless intercept stations around Britain and all over the world. Hundreds of wireless operators, many of them who were civilians, listened to German, Italian and Japanese radio networks and meticulously logged everything they heard. Some messages were then used tactically but most were sent on to Station X – Bletchley Park – where they were deciphered, translated and consolidated to build a comprehensive overview of the enemy’s movements and intentions.

Meticulously researched, drawing on lots of interviews with those who survived. This book aims to be the definitive history of the women who helped win the war.

The first part of the book, somewhat oddly, focuses on the men who set up the Y Service. While the background is important - I'm not sure there needs to be quite so much of the thrilling-adventures-of-manly-men.

There are amazing tales of high adventure and low skulduggery. But what interested me most was the way that sexism almost completely collapsed the war effort. From refusing to accept women, to preventing them from having uniforms, it seems like the British military did everything in its power to reduce its strength by 50%. When women travelled overseas to help the war effort, some were simply shipped back!

Frankly, it seems improbably that the British won the war. Everything was done on a shoestring budget, there was very little co-ordination, and it was led by lots of posh men who couldn't see past their own blinkered existence.

There are some lovely personal stories tales in the book. From women falling in love, to single-handedly delivering crucial signals intercepts - it really is a glorious romp.

It does descend slightly into a list of events - battles, telegrams, and executive orders. And some of the military terminology - and outmoded British slang - is a bit dense to wade through. But, overall, it's a great retelling of the experiences of a group of people who have been overlooked for too long.

At its core is a story of the power of appreciation.

Even in wartime, the SD Wrens were under-appreciated, and it is a common theme in their memoirs that they were kept in the dark, Rosemary Lyster joining the chorus of women who grumbled ‘No one, of course, told us if our work was valuable – we did not need to know!’

How do you keep up morale when you never tell people how vital their work has been? How do you encourage the next generation if you can never tell the story of success? How do you honour people when their existence is both sacred and scandalous?

This book goes some way to setting the record straight.

Thanks to NetGalley for the preview copy. The book is published later this year and is available to pre-order from the links below.

Like many Brits, I learned about the Second World War at school. I devoured books - fiction and non - about the war. What interested me wasn't the tales of derring-do, of men fighting for their lives, bombs, guns, bullets and knives. No, what interested me was the idea about intelligence. The concept that by learning about your enemy you could understand and counteract their efforts.

I don't remember where I first heard about Bletchley Park and the Enigma Machine. I certainly remember it from Simon Singh's The Code Book and Neil Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. What I do remember is being astounded by the mathematical brilliance of the people involved in designing the first computers. That a bunch of mathematicians and - as we'd call them today - computer programers could shorten the war by an estimated 18 months. They never fired a single shot. They never dropped a bomb. They never designed a killing machine. They sat and thought. Then built. Then thought some more. Then they defeated their enemy. And they did it all an hour away from London. How could I resist the urge to go?

The event was unOrganised by Big Geek Day Out.

Big Geek Days Out are "unEvents" - one person organises a time and place for people to meet and that's it. Everything else is done by the people coming to the event.

An annual ticket to Bletchley Park is a mere £8.50. An utter bargain.

The tragedy of Bletchley is three-fold. The work it did was kept secret for so long that many of those involved died before they could receive proper recognition. The secrecy robbed Britain of a competitive advantage in designing the next generation of computers. Finally, the park has been ignored by the Government and been allowed to decay.

This is perhaps the only second world war battleground that exists on British soil. This museum is a national treasure and should be treated as such.

Here are some images and video from the day. You can also view the entire set on Flickr.

Alan Turing

It's no exaggeration to say that Turing is the father of the computer. It's also no exaggeration to say that he was betrayed by his government.

An Original Enigma Machine

Bletchley holds an original Enigma Machine. I was lucky enough to help one of the guides demonstrate its formidable encryption and decryption capabilities. Had the Wehrmacht better understood cryptography and its limitations, the Enigma could have been their deadliest weapon. As it was, the weaknesses were discovered and exploited by a remarkable team of people.

Russian Fialka M125 Cypher Machine

They also have an amazing array of historical encryption devices, including this Russian example.

Finally, the tour guides at Bletchley are quite magnificent. Here's our guide talking about Colossus.

If you have even the slightest interest in the history of computing, you owe it to yourself to visit Bletchley Park.

"Hello dear, would you like some cake or a drink?" Are the first words I receive before even asking my planed out questions. I decline the offer.

"I remember," she begins when questioned about the war, "I was about eleven years old, I was in Needham Market at the time when we hear that we were at war with Germany. It was quite a shock even though we were expecting it."

When asking about evacuation, this short but strong willed lady went slightly quiet, "My mother had died about two weeks before war was announced and the family was in turmoil, it was a welcome relief for me, my parents and my siblings just to get away from the tragedy. Unfortunately we were all sent to different homes on the south cost. This was unfortunate because 3 months later I was sent home because of fear of invasion. I wouldn't say I enjoyed evacuation, no, but I didn't find it that bad. After being sent home I was evacuated once more. This time I was not so happy with my new family, I just missed my father and sisters too much. I came home two weeks later.

I began probing about the bombing raids, living in the middle of London must have been pretty horrific.

"Luckily we never got personally bombed out, although once our windows imploded and I got a lot of glass in my back, once a couple of incendiary devices landed in our garden. Most of our lives were spent in the shelter either in the garden or in the cellar. Because of the war and the fact that schools were shut and I didn't want to go to the factories I began secretarial work. One day our office was almost hit by a V1. It was very frightening, once we got out my boss gave me my first brandy and my first cigarette!

The worst part about living in London? Everything! You could only travel by buses there was no night life, every thing was blacked out. There was a dreadful lack of food and clothes. I remember having to save all the potato peelings and suchlike to send away to feed the animals."

"Being Jewish must have affected you." I asked. "No, no it didn't; people were to busy worrying about the war to worry about race, it also meant that we could swap our bacon ration for other foodstuffs. My father was affected because he had been brought to England from Russia when he was little, because when war broke out Russia was neutral my Father had to be issued with alien papers and his movements were restricted, as soon as Russia entered the war every thing was fine and he was no longer thought a threat."

Of course I had to ask about V.E. Day. "We knew it was coming, it was a question of when. In the end although we all went to Trafalgar Square it was a bit of an anti-climax; there was still a shortage of food and clothes and the soldiers still weren't back."

"And finally," I asked "What was your greatest memory of the war." "The moral," she said instantly "The moral was very high, we always thought we were going to win and Churchill's speeches made us sure."